17″ MacBook Pro disassembly reveals ginormous battery

The new 17" unibody MacBook Pro has already undergone an autopsy and had its …

Our friends at iFixit are currently in the process of dissecting a brand new 17" unibody MacBook Pro and are posting pictures as they go. Of course we were interested, as any self-respecting geek would be, and we have gleaned some interesting information from what they have so far.

First off, the hard drive doesn't look too terrible to replace for the somewhat savvy user. The process only requires the removal of about a dozen screws of various lengths—all of which, amazingly enough, seem to be Phillips heads. After that, a careful disconnect of the SATA cable and a pull of the infamous plastic tab is required, and the drive is free. You can then replace the smaller slower drive with your choice of gigantic 7200rpm drive or speedy SSD drive without the Apple tax. If you have worked on older iBooks or PowerBooks, this probably won't be any more challenging.

Perhaps the most interesting of the information divulged thus far is that of the super-special built-in 95-watt-hour lithium-polymer battery. In case you were wondering, the thing is huge, and we're not talking "oh, wow, that's kind of big". This is—forgive the somewhat dated phrase—Xbox huge. The battery weighs in at 1.5 pounds and spans close to the entire width of the machine. It hooks up through a wired connector and is screwed to the case via "tri-wing" screws. It even has a sticker spanning across the battery and onto the optical drive that reads: "Warning. Do not remove this battery" in four different languages.

There are more tidbits to learn from what has been written thus far, and new nuggets are popping up by the minute. If you're interested, make sure you head over to the iFixit website and read the whole thing.